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The problematic use of social media progressively worsens among a large proportion of users. However, the theory-driven investigation into social media addiction behavior remains far from adequate. Among the countable information system studies on the dark side of social media, the focus lies on users' subjective feelings and perceived value. The technical features of the social media platform have been ignored. Accordingly, this study explores the formation of social media addiction considering the perspectives of users and social media per se on the basis of extended motivational framework and attachment theory.

This study investigates the formation of social media addiction with particular focus on WeChat. A field survey with 505 subjects of WeChat users was conducted to investigate the research model.

Results demonstrate that social media addiction is determined by individuals' emotional and functional attachment to the platform. These attachments are in turn influenced by motivational (perceived enjoyment and social interaction) and technical (informational support, system quality and personalization) factors.

First, this study explains the underlying mechanism of how users develop social media addiction. Second, it highlights the importance of users' motivations and emotional dependence at this point. It also focuses on the technical system of the platform that plays a key role in the formation of addictive usage behavior. Third, it extends attachment theory to the context of social media addictive behavior.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the dynamic effects of users’ initial experience and user attachment on downloading information-seeking (e.g. news, map, education) and -sharing (e.g. messenger, chatting, social networks) applications.

From one of the largest application stores in South Korea, 225 applications were examined through analysis of 1.5 years of download records. Logistic regression and Bayesian models including time-varying coefficients were used.

Over time, the download patterns of users of the app market become dynamic. In the initial stage, users have a tendency to download apps of similar types. For example, users who initially download information-seeking applications continue to download these types of applications more frequently than information-sharing applications. In the later stage, however, users tend to download applications that accord with their attachment intensity. Users who want to share information with others are more likely to download information-sharing applications as compared to information-seeking ones. Finally, this tendency persists with the accumulation of more experience.

This study applies existing models and theories from previous research to the app market, such as state dependence, intrinsic motivation, and time-varying coefficient models. However, this study focuses on information-seeking and -sharing applications. Therefore, further study is needed in order to extend the findings to other types of applications, including games, paid applications, and so on.

This study provides valuable information for marketing managers running application stores and app developers who want to maximize performance. In the initial stages when users download apps, app market managers must recommend apps with consideration of both the users’ attachment and their initial experience, but after app users have accumulated some experience, only user attachment should be considered as a criterion for recommendations.

This is a unique study in which users’ download behavior regarding information-seeking and -sharing applications is analyzed using long-term actual data.

The purpose of this paper is to examine users’ satisfaction and attachment to beaches along the Atlantic Ocean in Lagos, Nigeria.

This study follows a quantitative research approach. For convenience, data were collected through a systematic random sampling technique, from 682 users in 10 of the 27 beaches in the study area.

The study revealed that users were overwhelmed by the natural beauty of the beach, the sand that makes sauntering and opportunities to network with other users. The overall results reveal a strong association of users’ reliance (place dependence) and identification with the beaches (place identity). As such, users’ satisfaction, identity with and dependence on the beach environmental attributes were influenced by factors such as uses and activities, comfort and image, sociability and access and linkages.

The study can strengthen the development of design guidelines and social policy for beaches along the Atlantic Ocean, Nigeria. Hence, the view may not be generalizable to other beaches along the Atlantic Ocean with different social, economic, cultural and political settings.

To build meaningful and emotional connections in beaches of developing countries, the paper of this nature is vital as it will aid the development of design guidelines and social policy for beaches through the provision of physical and social features that enhance people-place relationships.

This study aims at exploring users' motives to form attachments within the social Q&A community context and identifying the differences between active users and lurkers when building emotional attachments. By utilizing the media system dependency (MSD) theory, this study investigates into the driving factors of dependency relations (understanding, orientation and play) to user attachments (i.e. attachment to the social Q&A community, attachment to content creators).

The research model is empirically validated by an online questionnaire among users of a social Q&A community. Deriving from the actual behavioral data, the authors divide 262 valid responses into 157 active users and 105 lurkers according to whether they post or not. The partial least squares (PLS) method is exploited to analyze the relationships in the model. In addition, the PLS-based multi-group analysis is conducted for comparing active users and lurkers.

The empirical results confirm that dependency relations (understanding, orientation and play) significantly influence user attachments. Multi-group analysis suggests that the effect of understanding dependency relations on attachment to content creators is stronger for active users than for lurkers. However, the effect of orientation dependency relations on user attachment is significant for lurkers but not significant for active users.

This study enriches the knowledge of the MSD theory by extending it to the social Q&A community setting. Based on the MSD theory, the relationships between three sides of dependency relations and two types of user attachments are hypothesized in the research model. Besides, the impact of user heterogeneity in building user emotional attachment still lacks consideration. This study is one of the first in the field of comparison studies to compare active users and lurkers in such context, providing a novel contribution in understanding the motivations and emotional responses of different users.

Attachment Theory can be regarded as central to the concept of relational security. There is a paucity of research examining the coherence of this construct for ward-based staff. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Five female nurses from the acute admission and assessment ward of a UK medium secure unit acted as participants. Semi-structured interviews were conducted, and inductive thematic analysis was applied.

Six themes; “staff-service user relationships”, “staff diversities”, “service user backgrounds”, “variability in service users’ presentations”, “service users with personality disorder are problematic” and “nurses do not use attachment” emerged from the data. The nurses used heuristic models of attachment-related behaviour and they lacked knowledge of constructs associated with Attachment Theory.

Acute admissions may not be representative of all treatment contexts. Traditional models of attachment style may have only limited relevance in forensic services.

Limited knowledge and confidence in the nurses regarding how Attachment Theory might apply to service users is interesting because it may limit the extent to which care, treatment and risk management might be informed by an understanding of service user representations of therapeutic relationships. Training and educational interventions for nurses that enhance understanding of personality development and attachment styles are warranted.

The importance of nurses for achieving relational security is emphasised and the adequacy of their training is questioned.

The study aims to develop a theoretical model that portrays the antecedents of emotional attachment in the travel context by combining branding, marketing and information systems theories.

The authors gather empirical data through a Web-based questionnaire from 236 respondents. The proposed theory-driven model is examined empirically by using confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling.

The findings suggest that social media rewards and benefits impact users’ brand commitment. Social media interactivity and rewards help building a stronger brand image. Brand commitment and brand image, in turn, affect emotional attachment positively.

Other unexamined constructs may add to the explanation of building brands using social media platforms. As this is an exploratory study in relation to enhancing emotional attachment in an online travel setting, other constructs such as brand page commitment, annoyance, social benefits and telepresence may be considered in future studies.

Practitioners might encounter ways to influence favorable perceptions and brand commitment when consumers use social media sites. The model addresses questions regarding the significant role of social media activities on influencing brand image and brand commitment that in turn influence the development of a strong emotional attachment.

This study examined the effects of social media activities including interactivity, psychological benefits and rewards on brand image and brand commitment, and the effects of brand image and brand commitment on emotional attachment in the travel context. The results offer further verification for the theory-based model presented in the study. Evidently, statistically significant and meaningful associations exist among the factors.

The key contribution of this study is that it presents and validates a theory-driven model that reveals the antecedents of sustainable emotional attachment. The proposed framework stresses the positive relationships among constructs and offers research basis for expansion in other settings.

本论文结合品牌、营销、以及信息系统等理论, 建立了一个理论模型以描述在旅游情境中影响情感依恋的各种要素。

作者通过网络问卷的形式收集了236份数据, 并且通过验证性因素分析和结构方程模型的手段来实际测量以理论为基础建立的模型。

本论文研究结果表明社交媒体的奖励和好处影响用户的品牌承诺。社交媒体的交互性以及奖励帮助建立更强的品牌形象。品牌承诺和品牌形象对情感依恋有着积极促进的作用。

社交媒体平台的品牌建立模型还存在一些其他变量尚未开发测量。本论文只是开拓了网络旅游平台的情感依恋研究的方向, 其他变量比如品牌专页承诺、烦恼、社交好处、以及网真等, 应该在未来的研究中得以深入。

执业者可能会遇到多种方法, 通过社交媒体网站的方式影响消费者的主观感知和品牌承诺。本论文提出的模型可以帮助执业者解决关于社交媒体活动对品牌形象和品牌承诺显著影响从而达到强烈情感依恋效果的诸多问题。

本论文研究了旅游产业中, 社交媒体活动, 包括交互性、心理好处和奖励对品牌形象和品牌承诺的影响, 以及品牌形象和品牌承诺对情感依恋的影响。研究结果进一步深入测量了提出的理论模型。很显然, 数据分析结果表明模型结构之间存在显著有意义的联系。

本论文最重要的贡献在于它提出并验证了一个理论模型, 显示可持续情感依恋的动力起因。本论文提出的模型强调了结构之间的积极联系, 并且为在其他情境中的研究延申做出启示。

The purpose of this paper is to answer the question of whether smartwatches will survive and gain their own niche within the consumer electronics market. Based on the stimulus–organism–response (S–O–R) framework, this study identifies and validates the impacts of both technological and fashion-related factors (interactivity, autonomy, visual aesthetics and self-expression) on product attachment towards smartwatches through user satisfaction and pleasure derived from their smartwatches.

The authors collected the survey data via online surveys from 198 respondents and tested measurement and structural models with the partial least square technique.

The authors found that both technological characteristics (interactivity and autonomy) and fashion-related characteristics (visual aesthetics and self-expression) have an impact on product attachment through pleasure.

Several other important characteristics of traditional wrist-watches such as durability or workmanship are not considered in this study, but should be included in future studies. The three-item measure of autonomy may be insufficient for more sophisticated wearable devices in the future. In future studies, the impact of product attachment on users’ continued usage should be examined.

This study provides important practical implications for smartwatch makers interested in product development, as users were found to consider fashion-related characteristics to be as important as technological characteristics.

This study is the first study that considers both aesthetic and technological factors for IT acceptance in the context of wearable devices. Also, instead of traditional IT acceptance measures such as continued use, this study investigates users’ product attachment, which is more relevant to the case of wearable devices.

The integration of social media and e-commerce has resulted in a rising phenomenon among individual content providers (ICPs), who used to offer free content, to provide consumers with paid content, such as online courses, Q&As or consultations. Despite the prevalence of ICPs’ content monetization, empirical research has rarely studied its underlying mechanism. This paper examines how the characteristics of free content contributed by ICPs on social media platforms influence their paid content sales, focusing on the perspective of human brand.

The empirical setting is an online knowledge exchange platform, where users are allowed to provide free content (e.g. answers) on the social media platform and launch paid content (e.g. lectures) on the e-commerce platform. A machine learning technique is employed to construct measures for the characteristics of free content, and fixed-effects estimation is presented to confirm which factors have a significant influence on the sales of paid content.

The empirical results show that the quality, diversity and expertness of free content have a significant positive impact on the sales of the ICP-paid content, with the brand popularity of ICP playing a mediating role.

This study is the first attempt to demystify the relationship between content contribution and ICPs’ content monetization from the perspective of human brand. The findings validate the effectiveness of the “Selling by Contribution” strategy and provide valuable insights for ICPs and social media platforms.

Young offenders are known to have more chaotic experiences in childhood than non-offenders, and this impacts on their attachments, coping styles and early maladaptive schemas (EMS). The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between these factors and drug use.

This study used self-report questionnaires on a sample of 105 incarcerated young offenders.

Attachment styles did not differentiate drug users from non-drug users. Drug users were found to be no more likely than non-drug users to use avoidant coping styles. However, they were more likely to have emotional coping styles. Drug users had more EMS, and overall, those with insecure attachments had more EMS. Individuals with emotional coping styles scored higher than those with rational coping styles on several EMS. Those with emotional coping styles scored lower on the emotional inhibition EMS than those with rational coping styles.

The evidence presented has implications for the understanding of drug use in young offenders by: providing support to the model proposed by Young et al. (2003) regarding how insecure attachments can contribute to EMS; providing support for Crittenden’s (2008) model of attachment whereby problematic behaviours such as drug use can be a strategy the individual uses to protect themselves at times of threat or discomfort; highlighting the need for an integrated model of substance use in offenders which incorporates early experiences, attachments and EMS; and highlighting why substance use may become a coping strategy in young offenders and how to engage them to meet their needs in pro-social ways.

The study contributes to the understanding of attachment, coping and drug use in a young offender population. It sets foundations in the authors’ understanding of patterns of EMS in young drug users and highlights the need for an integrated model of substance use which incorporates early experiences, attachments and EMS.

The ever-growing popularity of social media platforms is evidence of consumers engaging emotionally with these brands. Given the prominence of social media in society, the purpose of this paper is to understand social media platforms from a “brand” perspective through examining the effect of consumers’ emotional attachment on social media consumer-based brand equity (CBBE).

This paper develops a model that outlines how emotional brand attachment with social media explains social media CBBE via shaping consumer perceptions of brand credibility and consumer satisfaction. An online survey of 340 Australian social media consumers provided data for empirical testing. The inclusion of multiple context-relevant covariates and use of a method-variance-adjusted data matrix, as well as an examination of an alternative model, adds robustness to the results.

The findings of this paper support the conceptual model, and the authors identify strong relationships between the focal variables. A phantom model analysis explicates specific indirect effects of emotional brand attachment on CBBE. The authors also find support for a fully mediated effect of emotional brand attachment on social media brand equity. Further, they broaden the nomological network of emotional brand attachment, outlining key outcomes.

This paper offers a conceptual mechanism (a chain-of-effects) of how consumer emotional brand attachment with social media brands translates into social media CBBE. It also finds that a brand’s credibility as well as its ability to perform against consumer expectations (i.e. satisfaction) are equally effective in translating emotional brand attachment into social media CBBE.

Social media brands are constantly challenged by rapid change and ongoing criticism over such issues as data privacy. The implications from this paper suggest that managers should make investments in creating (reinforcing) emotional connections with social media consumers, as this will favorably impact CBBE by way of a relational mechanism, that is, via enhancing credibility and consumer satisfaction.

Lately, social media in general has suffered from a crisis of trust in society. The enhanced credibility of social media brands resulting from consumers’ emotional attachments will potentially serve to enhance its acceptance as a credible form of media in society.

Social media platforms are often examined as brand-building platforms. This paper adopts a different perspective, examining social media platforms as brands per se and the effects of emotional attachments that consumers develop towards these. This paper offers valuable insights into how consumers’ emotional attachments drive vital brand judgments such as credibility and satisfaction, ultimately culminating into social media CBBE.